Frankenblog Musik Messe 08 (pt3)

Wednesday 12/03/08

Up early, shower and shave down for breakfast with my similarly bleary eyed colleagues. Then back to my room to change into my new grey Paul Smith suit, clean my teeth and pick up my bag for the day’s meetings. Out to the tram and this time there isn’t exactly a queue but the tram is full (we are the first stop) of people all obviously working at the Messe – bedecked in a variety of suits, uniforms and company logo bedecked jackets and shirts.

On stand for around 8.30am, just time to get everything in place before the onslaught as the show opens at 9am. Out stand is close to the main doors in Hall 8.0 so its not long before we are very busy with people on the stand. Almost immediately I see Kiyoshi and Yasuhiro from our Japanese distributor which gets me paranoid that I’ve messed up my meeting schedule. Luckily they tell me they are just checking in and using our stand as a point of reference. Phew! Didn’t want my meetings to get out of synch already within the first hour of the show. Luckily I’m not Chris, who has distributor meetings back to back for the first 3 days – guess that’s the advantage of dealing with Asia, it’s a long way away. However, as Paul is out with the demo system, it does leave me on point dealing with majority of enquiries especially about the much vaunted FlexArray.

“So this is your new line Array?”

“Well, it’s actually a very flexible system that can be used either as a single or clustered point source as well as in Line Source Mode for both smaller and larger shows”

“So it’s a Line Array”

“It’s both a point source and a line source”

Then taking them through the details and specification, trying to convince them that its not just another line array, its much more than that.

“So you’ve finally built a Line Array then?”

“No, not finally. We have built line arrays and many other products before that never see the light of day in public. Unless they have the right feature and more importantly the Turbo “sound” we don’t release them. FlexArray acts as a Line Source but more importantly it sounds like Turbosound box. It has the innovation in both driver and wave-guide design you’d expect from Turbosound. It also has Low Mid”

And so on and so on until 11am and the press call. Suddenly there is a big crowd of 50+ people crowded around the stand reception area, effectively blocking the aisle. I realise who they all are, the poor unfortunates who have to spend the first 2 or 3 days of the show running from one press call in Hall 4 to their next in Hall 8 then back again.

Simon, our MD, welcomes them all then hands over to Dom Harter from R&D to explain a little more about some of the technological advances of the products we are launching– as well as Flex there is the Impact family of compact plastic install speakers with a funky new look and clever integrated bracket, and a new self-powered version of the TSW-218 horn-loaded bin that now makes a great partner to any system especially the TA-500DP & TA-500tDP – onto an unsuspecting Frankfurt. Obviously most interest is in FlexArray. Speeches over some of the press sprint off to the next product launch but many from the more Pro-Audio orientated press cluster in little groups around various bits of the stand, especially near the Flex display.

As feeding frenzy dies down I get drawn into conversation and explanation with various interested journalists and photographers. I do a piece to Flash Mic (clever bit of kit, that) unprompted for Audio Media’s Messe Podcast. Then a detailed explanation of the theory around FlexArray as well as both dendritic and polyhorn concepts, followed by some photos for the French Magazine, Sono. And finally a discussion and more photos for a Spanish Website, Dr ProAudio.com.

After all that its back to meetings with some of my Middle Eastern and Asian distributors, which is after dealing with the press a bit of a relief. The meetings have a kind of pattern. Firstly the greetings and pleasantries about their journey and families, then a walk through of the new product paying particular interest to the FlexArray to ensure that they take away enough information to deal with the “So you’ve got a line now” type question. Then pricing, purchasing, and onto upcoming developments and changes at Turbosound or at their company. Then we examine any issues that they may have concerning our business together, or particular projects and shake hands and say good bye. Most then disappear off to their next meeting but they all will be back to look at the new product again, have a further chat and to ask further question. They quite often bring back some of their own contacts or customers with them, so we inevitably go through FlexArray again for their benefit.

When there’s no meeting I try to get five minutes to myself, but that never seems to work. There’s always someone that wants some information, or that has a question. The show lasts from 9am until 6pm and as the magic hour approaches my voice is going and my feet ache. Today my diet has consisted of coffee, Apfel San and breadsticks. Still it could have been worse - outside the weather has been terrible and I’m not doing the demos!

A post show beer on the stand with our German distributors, and a generally good feeling about the first day of the show. The new product has been received well and we have already taken some decent sized orders for FlexArray from right across the planet.

Then a treat, cabs back to the hotel, a quick debriefing drink in the hotel bar and we’re off to dinner. This time in an Indian restaurant we always swear we’ll never go back to but always seem to end up in there having ordered too much of its salty food. We do invent a new product in the restaurant. Its called a Lime Array. Then the tram, the hotel and bed.